Simply Stem Ginger

Oh this is a good one. And more simple than you might imagine. A few Saturdays ago, it was a sunny afternoon and me and Hungry Hubby had returned home with our shopping and a handful of freebie magazines I’d collected as we shopped. One happened to be Tesco’s magazine. This won’t be the first time I have found a real gem of a recipe or even more simply an idea which has inspired me but it is probably the best one I’ve found so far! So, what is it a recipe for I hear you ask?! Homemade stem ginger, I cry!

This really could not get easier and if you feel nervous about preserving or making jam, this would be an excellent introduction. You simply boil some peeled ginger until tender then add sugar and cook until a syrup forms around it. Crikey, I barely need to write up a recipe for it but I will give you more instructions than that!

Depending where you come from, you may call stem ginger something else – perhaps preserved, candied or glacé ginger. Once, I bought a jar of it which was called (bizarrely) Chinese ginger. I say bizarre, as a foodie friend from Singapore told me recently she couldn’t get anything like this herself locally! I only wish I’d discovered this method and realised what a gem it is; I could have encouraged her to make her own. I encourage you to make some. It is fantastic.

One of the things I love about this recipe is you could make a very small amount or a huge, huge vat full and as long as you know the weight of you peeled ginger and have the equivalent amount of sugar, you are good to go my friend. I think it would be a magnificent idea to make a big batch that you good bottle up and give away as gifts – especially around Christmas time. Apologies for bringing up the “C” word in May. My bad. You could even use more water and sugar and bottle up the syrup separately to the ginger to use on ice creams, to ripple into mascarpone and sandwich sponge cakes with, to dribble onto your breakfast yogurt, to perhaps add to soda water with a twist of lime. Let your imagination run riot.

Just look at that colour. I had a couple of stem ginger nuggets remaining from a store bought jar (which may interest you to know cost more than three times the amount of this home spun version) and I compared and contrasted. The store bought looked pale and the syrup runny and almost colourless. I suspect they cook the ginger then pour over a ton of simple sugar (sugar and water) rather than simmering the two together to get as much ginger flavour as possible into the syrup. Jo is not impressed. Also, the fragrance, not to mention the flavour of the home made stem ginger was oh so more potent. I picked up a large piece of fresh ginger root and used it the same day so it’s skin was moist and the flesh tender. Those who love ginger as I do will surely love its fiery heat as much as the palate cleansing, well-being inducing juicy flavour. Making this yourself is not only cheaper than buying a jar, it is world’s apart in the flavour stakes.

Once you have your stem ginger and you have finished clapping your hands with joy, you need to know what to do with it. A quick typing of “ginger” into the search box on this blog will show you just how much of a ginger nut I am. Us Brits love the stuff and if you have never tried it, I implore you to take a leap of faith and make some for yourself. Chop it and add to ginger biscuits or cookies, mix into and top a steamed stem ginger pudding, maybe make an Anglo-Australian take on a lamington with some. Add it to some scones (like my hot cross ones), maybe make a version of my vanilla yogurt cake and add some ground ginger to the cakes and stem ginger to a buttercream filling with some lemon curd. I might just do that this week!

However, what I did with it first is make my Step Mum and Daddums’s favourite ginger thing – this triple spiced ginger cake. They are coming to stay this week and I am very excited to have them back at the Apple Chapel and will be doing tons of cooking in celebration! Step Mum just adores this cake – she claims “not to do pudding” yet she usually manages to make short work of most of my offerings with surprising gusto for one not blessed (cursed) with a sweet tooth and this cake wins her over every time. A jug full of custard is usually brought out when this squidgey, damply delicious, sweet and sticky yet heavily spiced and hot with it cake is about and you won’t find a soul turning it down. I do believe it is the most wonderful of the homemade gingerbread recipes and by gingerbread, I mean this soft and sweet cake version, not the hard cookie version. Think McVities Jamaica Cake but oh so much better for making it yourself. It likes to be wrapped up and tucked away for five days before eating to make the most of the spice and the squidge. It is a delight to eat. Perfect for pudding and an excellent use of your freshly homemade stem ginger. I defy you not to feel like the ultimate Domestic Goddess if you make this cracking little recipe, and proudly display a couple of jars on your pantry shelves.

Homemade Stem Ginger

Ingredients

• Fresh ginger root
• An equivalent amount of caster sugar
• Sterilised glass jars and lids

 

Method

1. Peel your ginger and weigh it – I used a piece which weighed 175g.  Measure out the equivalent weight in caster sugar and put to one side.
2. Slice your ginger into evenly sliced coins – not quite a centimetre thick is about right.
3. Put your ginger in a pan only just large enough to accommodate it and cover by half an inch with cold water.  Bring to the boil then simmer, partially covered for an hour until tender – depending on how supple your ginger was to begin with, this may take longer.  Just test it with the point of a knife as you would for potatoes.  Top up with water if it bubbles away before the ginger is cooked.
4. Once cooked and tender, and the water has reduced down to barely cover the ginger add in your sugar and return to the heat, stirring to help dissolve.
5. Bring to the boil then reduce the heat so it is gently bubbling until the water and sugar forms a syrup similar in texture to runny honey.
6. Spoon into a sterilised* jar and seal immediately.  If not using immediately it should keep in a cool dark cupboard for a very long time.  Once open, store in the fridge and try to keep the ginger chunks covered in syrup.

*=To “sterilise” your jars you can either put them through the hot wash in your dishwasher or you can wash in hot soapy water and rinse throughly before putting in a low oven until dry.  Use the jars whilst the preserves and the jars are still hot and seal immediately.  I reuse store bought jar jams or buy ones for the purpose of home-preserving which will withstand the temperatures required to sterilise them.

Recipe and method property of Jo Blogs Jo Bakes of www.joblogsjobakes.wordpress.com but inspired by Tesco Magazine (no author cited to credit).